


Missile Kid

by Psyche



Category: Bandom, Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys (Album), My Chemical Romance
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-05-30
Updated: 2013-03-12
Packaged: 2017-11-06 07:45:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/416436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Psyche/pseuds/Psyche
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'It wasn’t that she wanted to die  exactly, because she didn't, not really. It was just that every single time she woke up she would wish so fervently that she hadn't. When she closed her eyes she would dream that she was safe in bed in Battery City. Her parents were in the other room and Luna, alive and safe, would sneak in to play with her and tell her stories.  Then, without fail, she would wake and be hit with a sucker-punch of despair; realising that it wasn’t real. That it would never be real again. '</p><p>The zones, 2017. How Grace came to be a zonerunner.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Life Better Lived

**Author's Note:**

> This story has been in the works for a long time. I hope someone out there enjoys it.

The garish grin loomed and flickered; stark black floated around the white screen on a continuous loop.  
Have a better day. Have a better day. Have a better day.  
The first few hours Grace was here she had stared at the screen hoping that maybe Mousekat or some other television program would appear. But as the hours stretched on and night fell, it was obvious that the hovering face was the only company she was going to have.  
She scuttled around on her lumpy mat and faced the grey chipped wall, putting her back to the screen. She shivered; it didn’t make a difference where she faced, she could still feel the eyes watching her.  
She resisted the urge to pound her small fists against the wall because that would have been childish and it wasn’t like she was seven anymore! 

She was just… just so…  
She struggled for a second to find a word to describe it. So… bored! It vaguely occurred to her that maybe she should be angry at being locked in the holding room. In the storybooks that her dad hid under the floorboards, the baddies always got mad at being caught and put in jail. In fact, they generally vowed revenge in a silly dramatic manner.  
But all Grace could seem to care about was when the flap in the door would rattle, announcing the arrival of her protein and pills.  
Of course, those exaggerated declarations of anger and revenge were only stories. Grace had long since come to the conclusion that they mustn’t have pills in that far far away kingdom. It was stupid of them really, because everyone knows that bad things only happen when you don’t take your pills. 

She picked at the flaking grey paint and found that her fingers were actually shaking a little. In fact, the more she thought about it, the more she thought that maybe she was a tiny bit worried? It felt like she’d been in this cell for days and nobody had even talked to her yet! Where they just going to leave her here? What if no one let her out?

Grace had been walking to school when they took her. She had been playing with the fraying thread of her white school-skirt and dragging her feet; not paying attention. Luna had visited her the night before had hadn’t left until after sunrise. It had been special because Luna never normally stayed after sunrise; she had always used to leave an hour or two before dawn- while it was still ‘safe’ as she put it. Grace had been playing their hushed conversation over and over in her head when the two draculoids had appeared. Grace remembered being unable to suppress a shiver at the sight of them. She knew that the draculoids were there to keep people safe, but that didn’t stop them creeping her out. They had taken her by each elbow and ushered her into the back of a waiting sleek white Scarecrow car and swiftly bound her wrists.  
Grace didn’t think anybody on the street even blinked an eye.  
She knew she probably should have been scared; but she hadn’t been.

Her parents were already there in the backseat of the car, their hands were bound too, their faces pale and stoic. She had tugged on her mothers sleeve clumsily with her tied hands and tried to ask what was happening. She didn’t answer; she didn’t even look at Grace.  
‘Dad?’ Grace had leaned over to her father, pleading; sort of worried now but just… not.  
‘Grace, darling, you have to be quiet’ her father had finally whispered, his curly hair bouncing slightly as he straightened himself to face forward again. She obeyed immediately, of course, even though she didn’t understand. Her mother hadn’t made a sound until they reached one of the smaller Battery Towers. There, two more draculoids had been waiting. At the sight of their beady eyes and scarlet gashes where their mouths should be, Grace felt a weird clenching sensation in her stomach. The second the car had halted they were opening the door and pulling Grace out. She didn’t even think to struggle but it seemed to snap something behind her mother’s eyes.

‘No!’ her mother had cried as she had desperately reached after her. But the car door was slammed in her face and before Grace could even react, the car had zoomed away…

A small sob broke through her lips as she hugged her knees in her darkened cell. She felt cold and shaky now... sort of strange. She wanted her mother, she wanted her dad to sit with her and tell her the stories that none of the other kids knew. She wanted Luna to slip through her window at night and tell her stories about ray guns and adventures. Luna didn’t even need books; she seemed to make up amazing stories all in her head.  
It was almost like Grace felt… scared.  
The flap in the door rattled and a gloved hand pushed a small tray of protein packs and pills into the room. Grace had crawled off her mat and knelt hastily in front of the tray. She downed the meal in a matter of seconds. It was only now that she realised how hungry she had been. She sighed and slumped down onto the stiff mat and lay there for a while, feeling calm and kind of sleepy. She lazily eyed the beaming BL/Ind logo. Have a Better Day, it insisted.  
Things were better, she foggily realised. She had been so silly to worry; the aftermath was secondary after all. It occurred to her, as she was drifting off, that she wasn’t sure if she actually understood what that meant.

 

**

 

Static. Static. Wait!  
…No, just Static.

Out of nowhere Ghoul reached forward from the backseat and smacked Poison’s hand from the radio dial.  
‘Cut it out!’ he muttered in mock fierceness, keeping his voice low for the sake of the cars sleeping occupants. Poison glanced quickly next to him at the slumped form of his brother, his blond hair at all angles against the sticky leather seat, before he shot an injured look over his shoulder at Ghoul. It didn’t last long. A childish look of glee crept over his face and completely ruined any pretence of hurt feelings. Before he knew it the grin jumped and infected Ghouls face too, spreading right to the corners. The Doctor’s broadcast wouldn’t be on until nightfall- hours away- and Poison knew that very well. But he just couldn’t stay still- couldn’t stop his fingers from twitching for the dial- not when they were so close… 

They’d been out in the zones for almost five years now and no one was more surprised to realise that they’d survived that long, than them.  
Five years of the searing heat of the day and bone chilling frost of the night. Five years of sleeping in cars or on the softest patch of rocky earth they could find. Five years of hoarding water like it was liquid gold.  
And yet five years on, it was hard to imagine life any other way.

Every night they spent on the hard desert ground instead of on sterile white sheets brought them a step closer to a free world. A tiny step, an insignificant step, maybe. After all, most of what they did would never make an immense impact on the might that was Better Living Industries; but that’s not what mattered. What mattered was that they chose to fight. They chose to reject a half-life. Eventually it would count for something. It had to.

In all this time their previous lives had become more like murky water in the back of their minds, than memories. It was kind of hard to picture when they tried to remember. Poison would often smirk to himself when thinking of what a past version of him would say if he could have seen what his life would have become. He probably would think he’d fallen into one of his comic books. He’d have probably give Kobra shit for his hair, tell Jet how badass he looked with an eye-patch and let Ghoul know, in no uncertain terms, that he hadn’t grown at all despite all his claiming when they first met that his growth spurt was still coming. 

There was one thing he knew his past self wouldn’t be thrilled with. Ha! But with any luck they were about to rectify that. Poison drummed his fingers on the steering wheel excitedly. He was damn-well going to kiss Tommy Chow Mein if he ever managed to meet the fucker! Even Jet, who carefully horded their barter-worthy goods with the stinginess of a pre-enlightened Scrooge, didn’t think twice about their most recent purchase. Poison could still remember the way Jet’s fingers had twitched when Show Pony had radioed in the news of Tommy’s latest items for sale.  
Items which now belonged to them. Items which lay in wait for them at Dr Death Defying’s south-east hidey-hole. Even Kobra had cracked a smile and fist pumped the air when the sale had been confirmed. Poison deftly flicked his firealarm hair out of his eyes and hit the gas harder. At this rate they might even get there before the evening broadcast. 

 

**

 

‘… But she was so very lovely, even in death, and the dwarves could not bear to bury her. So they placed Snow White in a coffin of glass and kept vigil over her night and day.’

Grace snorted and her father looked up, his mouth curving slowly into a confused smile.  
‘What’s funny about that?’ he teased her.  
‘I dunno… it just seems like a stupid thing to do.’ She tried to explain. ‘I mean they thought she was dead, right? So they should have buried her! Not stand around looking at her,’ she giggled again, the characters in her dad’s floorboard books never seemed to make any sense!  
‘They missed her; they were grieving’ her father said quietly. Grace picked up on her fathers tone and her snickering faltered.  
‘What’s grieving?’ she asked. Her father had just sighed, closing the book.  
‘Not something that you’ll ever have to worry about’ he assured her, leaning down to kiss her on the forehead…

Bang! 

The clash of metal ripped Grace from her dream suddenly, her heart racing before she could even open her eyes. Dazed, she blinked a couple of times before launching herself into the waiting arms masked figure before her.

‘Luna!’ she squealed. Her heart seemed to swell so fast she thought it might burst.

‘Quick, motorbaby, we gotta run!’ she grinned grabbing Grace’s hand with one of hers and drawing the shiny red and black raygun, that she never let Grace touch, with the other.  
She really was the coolest thing Grace had ever seen.  
But she never got to see Luna zap her gun (at least that’s the sound Grace imagined it would make). There were only two draculoids posted by her door and they were slumped, unmoving, on the ground. Grace couldn’t make out what was wrong with them, but whatever it was they wouldn’t be chasing anyone in a hurry. It didn’t mean they were free yet, of course. More draculoids wouldn’t be far away. They’d know. They always knew. Even now as they burst out the front doors she could hear a siren firing off in the distance.  
That just seemed to make Luna laugh. Grace had always figured she was a little bit crazy. 

They scrambled into Luna’s rusty car. Grace loved it; she had never seen another car like it in Battery City. It was really dirty and had messy red stripes painted over the bonnet. She never understood why her Dad wouldn’t get them one like Luna’s; she could have made it pretty for him.  
Luna grinned over at Grace as she turned the key in the ignition. Them with the spluttering grunt of an awakening engine and a squeal of tires they shot off towards the pre-dawn glow

**

The heat was stifling; it seemed to cloud around her body. Grace reached out trying to push the covers off but her sluggish hands found nothing. She blinked blurrily and sat up in Luna’s rumbling car taking only a heartbeat to remember where she was.  
‘Morning baby’ Luna cooed, reaching over and ruffling her mop of brown hair.  
Grace stared out the window in absolute wonder and tried to ignore the childish idea that maybe Luna’s car was actually a spaceship that had spirited her away to another planet. Grace could see nothing but yellow dust plains for miles! There were these funny little spindly trees everywhere dotting the blinding horizon with green specs. And the sky! The sky was so blue! Had it always been like that?  
They were flying down faded grey gravel; faster than Grace had even imagined cars could go. She couldn’t suppress her grin. Oh she really, really liked that. She was flying! 

‘Luna, where are we!’ she giggled, reaching for Luna’s shiny red mask on the dashboard and putting it on herself, beaming at her crazy reflection in the mirror.  
‘In the desert, kiddo. Out in the zones’ she smiled, pushing back the long black hair whipping around her face. Grace’s giggling faltered; her mouth fell open under the mask.  
‘Th… the zones? But Luna wont we die? People can’t live in the zones… they get the sickness!’ she babbled on until Luna put one hand on her lap calming her.  
‘Grace, that’s not true. A lot of people live in the zones.’ She assured her.  
Grace’s mouth twisted; that’s not what they told her in school.

‘There are parts that can be dangerous, but you know that I wouldn’t take you there,’ she reminded Grace.  
‘Then where are we going?’ Grace asked. Luna put both hands back on the steering wheel and bit her lip.  
‘First I’m gonna take you to see my friend, Tommy. He’s real nice and he’ll know how to help you through this. And then we can go anywhere we like, motorbaby, I’ll keep you safe.’ Grace thought the last part sounded a bit grim and what did she mean ‘help her through this’? She remained silent though. It was habit she supposed. At school they were punished for speaking out of turn. Luna had always let her though…

‘Luna, we’re gonna go back to get mom and dad, right?’ Grace asked suddenly. Luna’s knuckles tightened on the dusty steering wheel.  
‘Right, Luna?’  
Luna drew a shaky breath.  
Your parents… they were in Scarecrow Towers, baby; real jail. I would have never had a chance. I…’ she paused shakily before continuing. ‘I’m only one woman, Gracie. You were only in a holding room and I… they were going replace you in society,’ her mouth hardened into a grim line, ‘Probably tell you that your mom and dad had died in some kind of accident.’  
She wasn’t making much sense.  
‘What about your friends?’ Grace countered quietly. Regularly featuring in her whispered midnight stories had been a group of friends, just like Luna, skulking around Battery city masked and armed.

She paused again, this time throwing her mouth twisted into a grimace. She gave shaky sigh.  
‘They’re a bit angry at me at the moment, Motorbaby. I suppose you could say they’re not talking to me.’  
Grace could see a tear snaking down Luna’s cheek. Grace launched over to give Luna a half hug, like a second seatbelt.  
‘Don’t cry, Luna, they’ll talk to you again! And jail is only for bad people, right? Mom and Dad, they didn’t do anything wrong! So they’ll let them out, right? It’s okay we can go back and get them!’ she said to Luna’s waist. She could feel a hand stroke her hair and inexplicably heard Luna give a tiny sob. Hadn’t she been listening? It was going to be okay!  
‘Oh, Motorbaby, they’re not going to come back. I’m so sorry,’ she whispered.

Grace pulled back and stared at Luna, watching her wipe her eyes smudging the colours on her face.  
‘Remember… Gracie, remember when I told you that you couldn’t let anyone know about me? That you couldn’t tell anyone when I came to visit you?’  
Grace did remember. She had looked forward to Luna’s midnight visits since she was a little girl. The visits were their secret. It had used to be just on her birthdays but in the last few years Luna had been slipping through her window more and more often. Her mother didn’t like Luna coming but Grace couldn’t understand why, Luna was so cool!  
She didn’t usually catch them but the night before they had been taken, Luna had fallen asleep whispering stories to her. Grace’s mother had woken them when the sleek orange glow of morning was already seeping through the window.  
‘You’re going to get us all ghosted, with your carelessness.’ She had hissed as Luna had leapt up. Luna had just given her a swift kiss on the cheek and reached for her mask on the bedside table.  
‘See you next time, Motorbaby’ she had whispered as she slipped out of Grace’s window.

‘Grace, are you listening? It’s important, baby’. Luna took one hand off the steering wheel to prod her out of her daydream. Grace was feeling really weird, her skin was crawling. She slouched down in her seat, feeling sweat slide down her forehead; she nodded.  
‘… they might have let them go before,’ Luna continued ‘but, baby, they found your father’s books.’ She gave a sad chuckle ‘Your mother always hated those books’. 

But Grace wasn’t listening anymore. She couldn’t work out if her skin was too hot or too cold. Her brain seemed to be trying to force its way out of her skull. Luna shot a glance at her as she shivered. She muttered something under her breath and Grace could feel the car speeding up. She stopped trying to talk to Grace at least which was good because she just couldn’t think straight. It took her a minute to realise that the person moaning pitifully was her. She couldn’t work out what that droning sound was, though. Luna was cursing audibly now, the car going even faster, if that was possible.  
Grace was too hazy to think properly but she knew something was wrong, she could tell by the way Luna kept looking at her with a bitten lip and wide eyes.  
A small scream escaped Grace, as without warning the car swerved off the road. The bushes here were denser here; their prickly branches pummelled the windows making terrible screeching noises. Noises that were punctured only by the loud drone that was reverberating through Grace’s chest, whatever was making it was very close now. They hadn’t gone very far when Grace was pitched forward as the car ground to a halt. She felt Luna’s arms around her as she was dragged limply out of the car. She tried to talk, she really did, she tried to walk but she couldn’t seem to make her body do what she told it to. She felt her back scrape against a rough surface and prickly leaves scratch her face as Luna set her down. She heard a strangled gasp: Luna was upset. She tried to comprehend it; to reach out and comfort her, but Luna held her in a tight hug and murmured against her shoulder.  
‘I love you my motorbaby… love you. You fucking stay hidden you hear me!’ she gasped ‘Oh God…’.  
Grace vaguely realised the droning noise had stopped. She felt a kiss on her cheek and heard Luna pulling her raygun out of its holster and leap to her feet. Grace heard the crunch of dry grass get softer as Luna ran. And then she was alone. 

‘Luna…?’ she whispered croakily and then promptly vomited all over the bush in front of her.  
The sun was cutting into her neck and yet her skin felt like ice. But it wasn’t just that it… her chest… ugh! She couldn’t describe it properly her chest felt like it was collapsing on itself. It was killing her. It was making her throat swell up and tears pour down her cheeks. What was happening to her? She didn’t understand, she’d never ever felt a pain like this. She could vaguely make out violent ‘pew’ noises and distant yells. Did Luna get back to the car? What was happening? What… As she felt her brain go cloudy the last thing she remembered was a heart-wrenching scream that pierced her chest.  
‘Oh’ she thought ‘I must be dead’ and she fell forward into the darkness.

 

**

 

It sounded like radio static.  
‘... were right D….I cant… -res nothing left…hell of a fallou- …up there, wait…’  
Silence.  
Grace wondered if Angels in Heaven used radios. Odd but she didn’t see why not.  
Polka Dots.  
They were blue.  
Surely you weren’t supposed to dream if you were dead. Even if you did she didn’t think polka dots were really the appropriate thing to dream about. Wasn’t her life supposed to be flashing before her eyes? But no- the dots were still there and they seemed to be talking to her now.  
‘…from, little critter?’  
Grace didn’t think deathly hallucinations should be allowed to ask her questions, especially those that encouraged her to think when all she wanted to do was go back to feeling nothing. She felt two cold fingers press against her neck. She flinched, it felt like rocks were ricocheting off her head and the pain was making it hard to appreciate the assumption that she wasn’t dead after all. Violently Grace pitched over and vomited again. Tears welled up in the corners of her eyes; why wouldn’t it just stop? But the dots where talking again.

‘Withdrawal’s a bitch? Huh, kid?’ She could hear them saying sympathetically and she belatedly realised the polka dots were a man. Without warning the ground fell away from beneath her and she moaned weakly in protest. Strong arms slung her around and she reached out and clung to his back, folding her tiny arms in a vice grip around his neck. She was already starting to lose consciousness as they started to roll away, but not before she heard the dot man mumble ‘…you’re cute and all but don’t you dare fucking hurl on me, kid.’

 

**

 

‘Oh! Oh baby I’ll never be without you again!’ Ghoul moaned stroking a rusted guitar which had definitely seen better days.  
Ghoul didn’t care; he already loved it was all his heart and soul. The underground room was filled with similar orgasmic outcries from the various Killjoys. Kobra was fondling a bass that appeared to be held together with duct tape in certain places. Jet was already shredding, his face a picture of pure ecstasy. Poison fiddled with an amp that, that if its looks were anything to go by, was working only on a miracle.  
Stationed in the corner, next to a pulley operated platform beneath the trap door, Dr Death Defying rumbled in silent laughter. 

‘Make some noise, boys!’ he laughed, but he doubted they heard him. Poison flew across the room and swooped down to hug the Doctor, quicker than a bullet Ghoul was adding his weight to the pile on. The Doctor gave a strangled cry and struggled against the buddle of killjoy. But he was grinning as he finally got them to jump back by running over their toes with his wheelchair.  
‘It’s Tommy you should be thankin,’ he chuckled watching Ghoul dart back to his guitar, as if it were an unattended newborn.  
‘Man I remember when Chow Mein still dealt in deadman boots and protein packs’ Kobra called across the room, without taking his eyes from the frets. ‘Where’s he getting this shit?’  
Kobra had meant the question rhetorically but Poison caught the doctor’s furrowed brow. He knelt down causally so he was level with the doctor.  
‘Where is he getting it from, Doc?’ he murmured, keeping his eyes on his ecstatic gang. He snuck a sideways glance at the Doctor, when he didn’t reply immediately.  
‘Word is, he’s got the Android Girls under his thumb now.’ He finally grunted.  
Poison’s eyes widened.  
‘No Shit!’ he said, catching Kobra’s look of concern from across the room. He replied by shaking his head ever so slightly- they’d talk about it later. 

The Android Girls were one of the most ruthless bands of outlaws in the zones. And they damn well had to be, living on the outskirts of Battery City is extremely dangerous for obvious reasons. Most life-valuing Killjoys stayed well away from the city unless they had a very good reason. The Android Girls survived by raiding the city at night. They were good, but the turnover rate in their gang was predictably high, being that close to the city meant they were constantly on Scarecrow’s radars. The only reason they continued to exist was that their ranks were continually filled with runaways. They were usually the first band of Killjoys escapees met when fleeing the city. They favoured the girls, taking them in and training them for raids. Poor kids. They’d have done better to continue out to the zones with the rejected boys. At least they’d have a longer life expectancy that way. But one thing they sure as hell did not do was answer to anybody. Poison smirked, those girls wrote the book on not taking anyone’s shit. So what were they doing turning over their hard earned spoils to Tommy Chow Mein?

Poison was knocked out of his musings by an angelic face dropping, upside down, in front of his own. He jerked back and laughed in surprise, looking up to see Show Pony leaning through the trap door his long dark hair falling around him like a halo.  
‘Channelling your inner Spider-man, I see’ he laughed. Show Pony just smiled and fluttered his eyelashes.  
‘A pretty red-head below me?’ he leered, ‘How could I resist?’  
A hand tugged on the back of Poison’s jacket, landing him in a heap next to the Doctor’s wheelchair.  
‘My God, you’re worse than Cherri! What is it?’  
The distressed look re-appeared on Show Pony’s steadily reddening face.  
‘Doctor, ugh! She won’t stop crying. She’s getting my mat all wet!’ he moaned petulantly.  
Ghoul took this as his cue to fill the room with raucous laughter.  
‘Trying your hand with the ladies, Pony?’ he laughed. ‘Doesn’t sound like its working out for you!’  
‘Yeah I’d say you’re probably doing it wrong,’ Kobra smirked and Jet chuckled softly behind him.  
Show Pony flipped them off and disappeared above them in a single sinuous move.  
‘Please, Doctor!’ his voice floated down.  
The Doctor chuckled at the helpless wail and motioned to the Killjoys to help him up. Jet and Ghoul reluctantly lay down their instruments and climbed up the wooden ladder adjacent to the lift, but their eyes kept flicking back to their guitars as if worried they might disappear. Poison gently pushed the doctor backwards onto the small platform and watched him rise steadily as Ghoul and Jet pulled on the simple rope pulley. He was impressed that Dr Death and Show Pony managed everything, just the two of them and they’d been doing it for years.

Kobra walked over, bass still in hand.  
‘What’s up with the Doctor?’ he asked. Poison paused for just a moment.  
‘Nothing,’ he said turning to smile at his brother. And it probably was just nothing, he consoled himself- plus they’d gotten instruments out of it hadn’t they? Maybe it would work out for the best.  
‘How’s it feel?’ he asked. Kobra didn’t need to ask what he meant.  
‘Aw Gee, it’s so amazing.’ He grinned. ‘You forget, you know?’ Poison frowned at the nickname. Kobra was the only one who could ever get away with using his old name, and even then it was only when they were alone. They’d learnt the hard way how important pseudonyms were in this day and age. By now the alias’s they assigned themselves were their names and apart from the occasional slip up, were all they used.  
‘Coming?’ Jet called down, breaking Poison’s line of thought. Kobra had already carefully placed his bass in an old crate with the other two and swiftly followed Poison up the ladder. 

They made their way through the deserted diner, the last vestiges of light leaked through the windows with a syrupy glow. They made their way over to Jet and Pony who were leaning against the door of a makeshift bedroom in one of the larger former pantries. Over their shoulders Poison spied the crumpled form of a little girl curled up on a sleeping mat, her head buried in the dirty pillow. The Doc was stationed at the foot of the mat watching as Poison knelt down next to Ghoul, who was whispering tenderly in the little girl’s ear. Out the corner of his eye he saw Pony make a disgusted noise and leave. Kobra swiftly took his spot, leaning against the door frame. The Doc watched him go and turned to catch Poison’s eye with an apologetic look. Poison knew what he was thinking. Pony came off as callous and insensitive, the truth was he just really didn’t know how to handle children. Poison turned back to the girl and felt his heart constrict as he watched her tiny shoulders convulse. He laid a soothing hand on her back like he used to when his own daughter had been…. Shit. Shit. He backtracked, refusing to finish that thought. It wouldn’t do any good for there to be two crying people in the room. Ghoul stood and went to stand next to the Doctor, letting Poison take his place. 

‘What’s wrong with her?’ he asked The Doc, his voice sounding strained. The Doc sighed.  
‘She’s withdrawing off the BLI emotion suppressant drugs.’ He said with a stiff jaw, as if holding back. ‘I hear they’ve been starting kids on it who are barely a year old. Poor kid has probably never felt an emotion to its full extent in her life.’ He spat.  
Kobra gasped from his position at the door.  
‘Shit,’ said Jet eloquently. ‘That’s… shit… that got to be a whole lot of feelings at once’.  
‘… She… she wont explode, will she?’ Kobra added quietly, only half joking. Ghoul rolled his eyes and reached over to punch him in the shoulder for his efforts.  
‘It’s not just that,’ The Doc continued, his eyes smouldering in quiet rage. ‘Pony found her on the side of the Getaway Mile, next to a burnt out car, the area covered in scorch marks.’  
Ghoul gripped his shoulder a little too hard.  
‘Dracs?’ he asked, not needing a response. The Doc nodded.  
‘She’s still in her BLI uniform, but judging by the car she was travelling with a zonerunner. Probably an Android Girl, being so close to the city.’  
Kobra hissed, subconsciously rubbing the scarring on his thigh. He’d had a nasty run in with an over-amorous Android Girl, not too long ago. She hadn’t taken kindly to his lack of interest. Dr Death whispered something to Ghoul, and he swiftly left the room. But Poison wasn’t paying attention, a high keening was sounding from the little girl; it was truly the most tragic sound. Poison thought he heard her sob words into the pillow. He leaned closed, rubbing her back.  
‘What was that, honey’ he asked softly.  
A puffy, hazel eye peaked out and met his own. She said it again, but he couldn’t make it out, her breathing was too erratic, too punctured with sobs. She tried again, desperate to make him understand her.

‘Lu- Luna!’ she choked. 

It was perhaps the most heart-wrenching sound Poison had ever heard. Before he could stop himself he was on the mat, buddling the sobbing girl into his arms. He rocked her back and forth, whispering God-know-what into her mop of curly hair. He desperately hoped that it was comforting. He didn’t know how long this went on, but the next thing he knew Ghoul was nudging his shoulder. He was holding a pill and an old jar filled with water. Poison glanced at Dr Death, who nodded curtly. Out the corner of his eye he could have sworn he saw Jet turn and leave, wiping his eye discreetly. The girl had cried herself into a stupor and as Poison took the pill from Ghoul and held it to her mouth, she looked up and met his eyes. There he saw the grief he knew all too well. The kind grief he would never wish upon his sworn enemies. The kind of grief that was never meant to blemish the eyes of a child. Meekly she swallowed the tablet and then the water and went limp in Poison’s arms. He lowered her gently, watching how her corkscrew curls lay sprawled in every direction on the pillow. She was asleep before he even pulled the covers over her.  
He could feel Ghoul behind him, his hand on Poison’s shoulder. Although it was a few minutes more before he could pull himself together enough to allow Ghoul to lead him away, back into the diner.


	2. Ghosts in my chest

Grace didn’t understand why she was still alive. 

And it wasn’t that she wanted to be dead exactly, because she didn’t- not really. But every single time she woke up she would wish so fervently that she hadn’t.

Every time she closed her eyes she would dream she was safe in bed in Battery City. Her parents were in the other room and Luna, alive and safe, would sneak in to play with her and tell her stories. And then without fail she would wake and be hit with a sucker-punch of despair; realising that it wasn’t real. That it would never be real again. 

She wanted more than anything in the world to go to sleep not wake up for years.  
Like Sleeping Beauty in her dad’s storybooks. And with that thought her weak chest seemed to collapse, and hot tears poured down her face, although she suspected that they had even as she slept. 

Her heart! Her heart was hurting. It felt like someone was squeezing it tight. She hadn’t realised that a feeling could do this to you. Weren’t feelings supposed to be in your head? Things that you thought or felt in your mind? 

Admittedly no one had ever really talked to her about it before, and why should they? Feelings had used to be so insignificant before. An annoying sensation that you knew was there but was so easily ignored. But this… tidal wave of feeling consumed her and there was nothing she could do to stop it. 

It devoured her, she couldn’t even think of anything else. The physical ache, never ever left. It wouldn’t be long now before she never had to feel again she supposed. She couldn’t imagine her body could withstand this much longer; it made her so weak. Even when she tried her hardest not to think about Luna or her parents, the hurt wouldn’t relent. She didn’t even think she had names for everything she felt. She longed for the sterile white rooms and the grinning black face of relief. She would give anything at all for those tiny little pills that she had always taken for granted. 

She bit back a gasp as she felt a soothing hand on her trembling back. 

He was back again, but she ignored him like always. She never talked to any of them, but the red-haired man always seemed to know when she was crying in the night. The pantry door would creak and he would come and sit by her mat until she fell asleep again. 

This whole emotion thing was new to her, but she thought she liked that. Sometimes the man would whisper soothing things to her. But if he whispered tonight she couldn’t tell. The desert wind was making the old diner windows rattle, something that seemed a lot scarier at night.

‘… but the little girl was too quick for the silly drac and she darted out from his grasp and the drac fell flat on his face!’

Huh?

Grace stilled for a moment and then peeked up at the red man sitting cross-legged next to her.  
He was telling her a story.  
She sat up slowly, shaking a little. It took a lot of effort; her body hadn’t really been paying attention to what she wanted it to do lately.

He was telling her a story. Just like Luna had. Feelings punched her in the gut again, but Grace determinedly pushed through.  
The man’s eyes widened and he faltered in his story at the sight of her actually acknowledging his presence. 

‘What next?’ she whispered croakily. The man smiled crookedly and ran his hands through his flaming hair, he actually looked nervous now she was listening. 

‘Well um… the girl uh…ran away into the desert and-‘

‘How did she get all the way out into the desert?’ Grace interrupted.

‘Wha-? … um she drove?’ he offered.

‘Kids can’t drive.’ Grace pouted. Luna told stories that made sense. Oh. Her insides were crumbling again. The stupid feelings made her face stretch and her eyes well up again. For a lingering second she couldn’t breathe. And then she was sobbing quietly again, as seemed to be her default state these days. 

She heard the man sigh and felt a twinge of guilt dive in to her overflowing dam of feeling, closely followed by hate. Hate at the feelings that made her hurt so much. Words couldn’t convey how over it she was.

More tentatively came the doubt, oozing in though the pit of her stomach. She forced herself to look at the red-haired man, his face looked almost as pained as hers. He reached out to comfort her, but quickly dropped his hand, as if scared it might do more harm than good. But it was that gesture that finally made Grace realise that all the man wanted to do was what Luna and her parents would have done; help her. 

Softly Grace let a tiny trickle of emotion slip through her lips.

‘I don’t get it…’ she whispered. She shakily climbed into the red-haired man’s lap. She wasn’t sure when she decided that she liked him. But if she let loneliness add itself to the crushing pile on top of her, she might just start wishing for her sleep to be forever.

He let her rest her head in the hollow between his neck and shoulder. He felt warm and comforting.  
She suddenly felt sure that he was someone’s dad. She didn’t know why, it just seemed right. She didn’t think a man this kind should have gone to waste. It just wouldn’t be fair if someone like this didn’t have a child and someone like… someone like the Polka Dot Man did. Ugh. If he was a daddy she felt so sorry for his kids.

‘What don’t you understand?’ he encouraged her.

Grace was silent for a moment. Those four words had taken so much effort; a leak in her rickety dam. She felt sure that if she let anything else out the dam would give way entirely. She desperately tried to make her breath sound steady. 

‘Why did she take me away?’ she finally whispered. She could feel the red man tense. When he finally spoke his voice sounded rough. 

‘You were taken? You didn’t want to leave?’

Grace’s eyes flew open- when had she closed them?- as she belatedly realised the red-haired man thought Luna had kidnapped her! He thought she was bad!

She swivelled round to look him in the eyes, to make him understand- Luna was the very best thing Grace had ever known.

‘No! no … yes, but Luna, She’s… You know?’ Grace knew she mustn’t be making much sense. ‘It’s not that, she… she rescued me from the room. But… But.’ Grace had to stop, tears were already fighting their way through; they never did leave Grace for long. The man never looked away, he smiled sadly, silently encouraging her to continue. 

‘B-But I thought she loved me.’ A terrible grimace pushed its way onto her face, making it hard for her to get the words out. ‘W-Why would she take me someplace where everything h-hurts? Why d-did she want me t-to hurt?’ 

That was all she could get out. She sobbed into the man’s shoulder and could feel her little body seizing up. She gripped tightly around his neck. Grace knew she was probably annoying him, that he would leave her at any second just like all the others had. But she couldn’t let him go.

The man didn’t try to leave though, he held her and whispered things to her like he had that first day and waited for her to cry herself out. Eons later when her head felt dizzy, her body drained, and no more tears would come, the red-haired man gently put her down on her mat. As he looked down at her, his expression was unreadable. 

‘It will get better, I promise’ he finally spoke. ‘The pain hurts twice as much as it did before...’ he paused to stroke her hair. ‘But, I promise you, the joy will be twice as good too.’

Grace tried to believe him. When she finally met his eyes, he flinched slightly. Did she scare him?

‘Nothing could ever be worth feeling like this.’ She said simply.

And she meant it with all her heart. She would gladly consent to never being happy again, if only the unrelenting pain would go away. The man’s mouth curled into a tight line and he had to look away. Grace hadn’t meant to upset him!

‘W-what’s your name?’ she asked timidly. Suddenly scared he might not come back next time she cried. The man had busied himself with pulling up Grace’s blankets. He looked up with a half smile.

‘Party Poison,’ he said a little smugly, obviously proud that his name was so cool.

Grace just snorted. 

‘That’s not a name!’ 

And she would know! One of her last classes in Battery City had been on the name list; the list of 46 names for girls and 57 names for boys that were deemed acceptable. Grace was certain that ‘Party Poison’ was most definitely not on that list. Although… now she thought about it neither was Luna. She yawned, in the end, simply too tired to argue.

‘I’m Gr-‘ she begun sleepily. 

‘Shhhh!’ he cut her off making outrageous sweeping gestures with his hands, his eyes wide. Ha. He looked silly. Grace just looked at him like he was ridiculous. Which she was starting to realise, he was a little bit.

‘It’s just uhh- names are dangerous, you know kid? You never tell your real name to anyone but your closest friends… or-’ he seemed to struggle to find an explanation he thought she’d understand. ‘or … the dracs will get you!’

The looming dead eyes and scarlet gashed mouths flashed though Grace’s head and she squeaked in terror before she could stop herself. 

‘No! I didn’t mean to scare you!’ Poison ran his hands through his hair again and muttered something under his breath. ‘I – I just mean, it can be dangerous.’

Oh. She got it now. Party Poison must just be what people called him. Huh. Maybe it was kind of cool. But she was way too sleepy to think of a fake-name now.

‘I’m Grace.’ She said clearly and defiantly. She liked Poison and plus, maybe now she told him her name he’d realise that she wanted them to be friends. A smile spread across Poison’s face. 

‘Nice to meet you, Grace’ he said softly.

 

She didn’t remember much more after that, later she figured she must have fallen asleep. It wasn’t really a memory, but Grace had a strangest feeling the next morning that the red-haired man had been singing softly to her as she had fallen asleep. But, of course, that couldn’t be right.  
~

 

The paint splattered van door slammed shut as Show Pony revved the engine. Poison walked around to the wound down window the Doctor was leaning out of.

‘I don’t think I need to explain the horrors that will befall you if I find you’ve touched the remaining equipment’ he smirked menacingly.

Poison returned the grin and saluted him, with mock sobriety, ignoring Show Pony as he revved again impatiently. 

‘I also know that I don’t need to tell you to keep her safe,’ he continued. ‘Use the tunnels if your ambushed, they come out by the gorge.’ 

Poison gripped the Doctor’s hand, hoping it conveyed everything it needed to. He let go swiftly as the van began to move, it gained speed quickly leaving him in a cloud of sand. 

Although the Doctor hadn’t specified, Poison thought they were probably heading towards one of the northern hideouts. Running pirate radio was serious business these days and Doctor Death Defying, the voice of the zones, had wasted no time scaling the BL/Ind kill list. Keep running; as the Doctor would always cant with dulcet tones in his broadcasts. 

Poison tore his gaze from the cloud of dust in the distance and trudged his way back to the vandalised diner. They really should be keeping to the Doctor’s advice; no runner in their right mind stayed in the same place for long. But he couldn’t bring him self to move the girl- Grace, he corrected himself- just yet. Soon. Maybe when she looked like she wouldn’t fall apart if someone so much as touched her. 

Even now he was terrified that she might not make it. That she was too young; too unprepared for the barrage of emotion. That maybe her heart would just give out. He lamented the fact that the first real feeling of her life had been grief.  
It would have been enough to break anyone, let alone a child. Oh God, he really couldn’t convey how much he just wanted people to stop dying. He made a mental note to conduct double the amount of patrols until then. 

Poison pushed aside a sheet hanging plywood, spray-painted with a mutant daisy- one of his designs of course. He stepped softly up to the pantry door and pushed it aside gently, planning on attempting to coax an unresponsive Grace into eating again. 

The cramped space was empty. He flicked on the light switch to try and make sure she wasn’t balled up in a shadowy corner. No light came on, of course, but it didn’t matter as the tiny space was obviously empty. 

Shit.

Okay. Well she can’t have gotten far, he told himself, desperately trying to keep his heart rate steady. Not a minute after he had promised her safety to the Doctor and he’d lost her.  
He forced his run to become a walk as he rounded the corner to the dinning hall.

‘Guys I think we’ve lost-’ he stopped.

Sitting in a booth between Kobra and Jet, the tiny girl was poking at the contents of a can of power pup with a very dubious look on her face. Jet flapped his hand in Poison’s direction and shushed him as if any noise might disturb the miracle of Grace about to eat. 

Poison sighed as a shuddery blanket of relief fell around him, only to be disturbed by a pang in his chest. She seemed even tinier than when he had first met her as if grief were slowly making her disappear.

He watched her bony elbows sticking out as she trying to get some beans on the end of her rusty fork. She made a pained face as she swallowed them, but she went back for more.  
Kobra gave a whoop of success and high fived Jet over Grace’s head. Poison slid into the booth and nudged Kobra.

‘Nice work’ he murmured, trying not to feel jealous. He’d spent two whole days trying to get her to eat.  
Jet ruffled her hair affectionately.

‘See it’s not that bad, is it?’ 

When she didn’t reply Kobra tickled her until a shaky smile broke through. Poison relaxed visibly. Heavy footsteps sounded as Ghoul rounded the corner.

‘Poison’ he called pulling on his gloves, the grim line of his mouth was all business. ‘Patrol, come on.’ And he turned on his heel and headed for the back exit. Poison just raised an eyebrow at Kobra.

‘We’ll be fine’ he rolled his eyes. ‘Go.’

‘Grace?’ Poison said softly ducking his head.

She tore herself from the power pup and met his eyes. He found it hard to read her expression but she nodded and he could only take it as a sign that she’d be alright. It didn’t stop him from giving Jet and his brother a hard stare as he stood to leave, just to make sure they were taking this seriously. 

All this earned him was another eye roll from Kobra.


	3. Children are the future

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Got 1 more chapter coming. Not likely to be finished (there doesn't seem to be much interest in the the Killjoys universe anymore anyway).  
> But is the most significant piece of creative writing i've ever done so I thought I'd put it up anyway.

The engine whined as Poison hammered the gas. He tore his narrowed eyes from dusty scenes flying past the window.  
Another dead day in the zones.

They’d just busted a Scarecrow camera up by the safe house near the zone four border. Poison’s fingers twitched at a phantom trigger as adrenaline fizzed through his veins. It felt so damn good to be up and zone running again. 

City runaways often had glorified visions of what life would be like in the zones. Before Poison had been driven out past the city border he remembered the whispered stories told about the runners - fast cars, the open road, dusting dracs with ease before breakfast. 

Poison smirked at the memory. There were days when all that was true, when the roar of the engine and the Doctor’s broadcast were their soundtrack. Those were the days he lived for. But what those whisperers didn’t seem to consider were the days in between.

The days when you were low on gas and batteries but couldn’t find a living soul on the desert plains to trade with. The days where the Doctor announces the death of the zonerunner who’d saved your life just the day before. The days where the dracs found you before your cold power pup breakfast. 

In reality destroying Scarecrow surveillance was actually how runners spent a lot of their time. Drac’s wouldn’t often come this far out into the zones unless it was part of a planned BL/Ind clean-up sweep; sweeps that were conducted whenever Scarecrow could pinpoint the whereabouts of pockets of city runaways.  
Too bad their cameras keep braking, Poison smirked. 

He turned to Ghoul, expecting to share, what would have surely been, a filmic hell-yeah-we-kick-ass moment. But Ghoul was stone-faced, his gaze fixed on the horizon. Poison pouted when he realised Ghoul wasn’t playing along. Fucking Killjoy. Ghoul met his glance with raised eyebrows letting him know without words exactly how childish he was being. Without turning his eyes back to the road Poison pulled off the cracked tarmac and onto the flat dirt towards the gorges.  
It isn’t until Ghoul still hadn’t cracked a smile by the time they slammed the dusty doors of the trans- am shut and began trudging down to the near-dry water bed, that Poison actually began to take his mood seriously. 

He took the only logical course of action and punched Ghoul in the shoulder. Ghoul stumbled slightly, but only because he wasn’t expecting it.  
‘What’s your problem?’ he said nonchalantly, when Ghoul glared at him.

Ghoul ignored him and kept walking, but Poison knew better than to let him simmer silently. The fucker could be downright hell to live with when he was in a bad mood.  
He launched himself at Ghoul’s retreating back, bear hugging his arms to his sides.

‘Spill! Or you shall never be free!’ he cackled with his best supervillian impression. They scuffled for a few seconds before Ghoul threw him off.  
‘Idiot’ he muttered, but Poison caught the small smile he was hiding as he said it.

They knelt by the water bed and cupped the water in their hands downing it in messy silence.

Poison started to scoop the murky water into the precious empty containers he’d brought down with them. Mentally thanking any omniscient beings listening, that Scarecrow didn’t seem to know about this particular water source yet. When it came down to it, water, gas and a charged gun were all a zonerunner needed. Without it they were as good as the mindless mannequins in Battery City. 

Ghoul wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and grabbed one of the containers, filling it beside Poison.

‘You know you’re getting too attached to the girl.’ he finally spoke, looking sideways at Poison,  
‘Grace.’ Poison corrected him.  
‘Exactly.’ Ghoul countered, with added eyebrow movement for emphasis. ‘She can’t stay with us.’  
Poison just scowled, feeling a sense of déjà vu, only last time he and Ghoul had been in agreement.  
‘We can barely keep ourselves alive!’ Ghoul exclaimed defensively when he saw his expression.  
‘What? Would you rather take her back to the city?’ Poison said, ignoring the voice in his head that told him to leave it.  
‘Why not?’ Ghoul muttered fiercely, but the fire flickered out of his eyes in a matter of seconds. 

‘ …didn’t mean that’ he sighed.  
Poison just nodded and screwed on the caps on to the containers, giving Ghoul a moment to compose himself. He stopped himself from reminding Ghoul that at least his daughters weren’t dead. He felt sticky, acidic guilt pool in his stomach, just like it always did when he realised that he wasn’t sure if he would actually prefer Ghoul’s situation to his own. 

Five years ago it had only been Poison, Kobra and Jet zonerunning. Ghoul had been their inside man in the city for nearly a year before Scarecrow finally figured who was stealing supplies and funnelling them to Killjoys.

The first signs of Better Living Industries had arrived, coincidently; a month after the sickness had erupted. The pandemic had steadily hacked away at the population with no discernable cure. Better Living had, at the time, been the definition of a Godsend. The Better Health pill not only cured the sickness but also almost every other malady known to man. It had been nothing short of a miracle. 

After gaining the adoration of the people and a monopoly in the health sector, Better Living Industries had begun to widen their horizons. Their status as saviour of an entire generation was such that nobody had much worried when Better Living began buying out farms and producing food at unmatchable cheap prices. It was surely a good thing, people would say, when they started introducing surveillance into every neighbourhood. It had seemed a logical step then when high-ranking officials within Better Living began running for government across the country. 

But not everyone had silenced the voice of reason in the back of their heads, as the company steadily gained power and influence. Poison, for one, had never been good at keeping his mouth shut. He had used his position of influence to urge the kids at every show they played, the cameras at every interview they gave and the world in every lyric he sung to open their minds. To think about what this meant and not to just sit back and take it. He had urged everyone to act now. 

Poison had always been on the paranoid side, but it wasn’t long before even Jet had to admit that Poison’s antics weren’t going unnoticed.  
In the end his rebellion had cost him everything. 

After the fires of 2012 and the free circulation of an upgraded Better Health Pill, that was now complete with state-of-the-art emotion suppressant, Better Living Industries gained complete control without anyone really realising. Any dissidents were swiftly silenced or else they fled to the zones. In the end Poison had lost a wife and child to the rebellion and had been one of the first zonerunners along with Kobra and Jet.

But Ghoul still had his girls. At that time they hadn’t even been sure they wouldn’t end up starving to death in the zones themselves, and Ghoul refused to risk his daughters. Poison even thought he may have felt the same in Ghoul’s situation. So Ghoul, with much effort, had played reformed citizen, and became their inside help. Kobra had dealt with the drops, in those days, as at the time Poison had still been too caught up in grief to do much more than viciously lash out with a vandalised BL/Ind Individual at every drac he could get his hands on. 

Poison liked to think he had come out of it stronger, that he had risen to the challenge of leading one of the original zonerunning gangs. Although some days it was easier to believe this than others.

When Scarecrow eventually came for Ghoul, he had been forced to leave everything and make a run for it in the middle of the night. He just barely avoided being dusted by stealing an enhanced Scarecrow patrol car and gunning it down the aptly named Getaway Mile. By sheer luck he ran into Doctor Death and Show Pony, who after seeing his ride had almost dusted Ghoul for the second time that night. When he had been reunited with the rest of the gang, Poison had originally been one of the loudest supporters for storming the city and rescuing Ghoul’s girls, desperate to make sure Ghoul didn’t have to go through the agony that he had months before.

They’d done it too- made it all the way to the Battery City Children’s Home for Better Living in the dead of a winter’s night four years ago. Poison remembered how Kobra had disabled the surveillance with stolen Scarecrow tech and waited in watch with Jet, as he and Ghoul had silently stalked though the darkened rooms of sleeping children; the orphans of dusted parents. He remembered reaching out to stroke Ghoul’s wrist as he became increasingly distressed, peering at each child’s sleeping face and not finding one he recognised. He remembered the way Ghoul’s voice cracked as he desperately whispered to Poison ‘I can’t - I can’t see them’ 

But most vividly, Poison remembered the tears that silently slipped down Ghoul’s cheeks when he finally found them. The girls had lay dreaming in the hospital quarter of the orphanage, hooked to wires and machines that translated their life into clinical beeps. Poison had rested his hand on Ghoul’s shoulder and said nothing.  
Because there had been nothing to say.

Children who caught the sickness became the walking dead unless they had constant access to Better Health medication. If they had taken the girls with them that night they would have not made it to see the sun rise. Sometimes Poison wondered if they had been infected on purpose when Ghoul’s role as a double agent had been discovered. Getting Ghoul out of there before they were clapped was one of the hardest tasks Poison had ever completed. He shuddered at the memory of Ghoul on his knees by their bedside, in tears, begging Poison to leave him behind, unable to stop holding their little hands and stroking their tiny faces.

 

Poison reached over and took the last container from Ghoul’s unsteady hands and secured it before squeezing Ghoul’s shoulder. He could only imagine how Ghoul felt to be looking after another man’s daughter in the zones while having to leave his own to a dull, colourless fate. It wasn’t fair; but neither was life. It didn’t change the fact that Poison hadn’t even thought about how this would affect Ghoul. 

He bit his lip.  
‘We could find some android girls to take her in.’ he finally suggested even though he was mentally recoiling at the idea.  
Ghoul just grimaced and got to his feet.  
‘Nah… wouldn’t wish that upon the kid’ he said with a small smirk. ‘M’being stupid. She should stay… of course she should just…’  
‘… keeping her alive is gonna be hell.’ Poison finished for him. ‘But you know we can do it.’ 

Ghoul reached for his gun and for a wild moment Poison thought Ghoul was going to threaten to shoot him for being so sappy. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time he’d threatened it. But the next second instincts kicked in and his gun was drawn and aimed in the direction Ghoul was looking.  
Aimed at nothing. 

‘What…?’ he began to ask, but Ghoul hadn’t relaxed his stance. He signalled to Poison to take cover and they fanned out, scanning the area. Poison finally saw what had spooked Ghoul.  
A brightly coloured body was lying sprawled at the water’s edge, partially obscured by the rough desert bushes on the opposite bank. Poison’s heart just about stopped when he noticed the polka dots and mop of dark hair. 

He eyed Ghoul panicked, but waited until they could be sure this wasn’t an ambush. Poison mentally ran through the signs. No tire tracks, no droning of the Scarecrow regulation motorcycles. No sign of activity either by the water or on any of the rocky ledges that encircled the gorge. Also the fact that after their oblivious chat they weren’t already ghosted. 

The desert was still and silent around them, the humid air clung to their tense bodies.

Eventually Poison signalled the all clear, but neither of them holstered their weapons as they raced to the body.

He heard Ghoul mutter ‘Thank fuck!’ as they neared the scene. The runner was wearing a pink jacket and leggings with turquoise spots; but it wasn’t Pony. Thank fuck, indeed.  
Poison approached the body slowly. More out of respect than squeamishness. Mortality was not something that could be ignored in the zones and it was depressingly common to come across dead runners. He put a hand on the cool shoulder and rolled the body over with baited breath. He let it out steadily as the limp body lolled onto its back. The fixed eyes of a women stared back at him, her pink and green mask hanging askew off her head. Poison reached for it and gently placed it over her face. No runner should be forced to die without their mask. He glanced back at Ghoul with a question in his eyes. Ghoul just shook his head- he didn’t recognise her either. 

Poison looked back down and his eye caught the charred scorch mark in the centre of her chest. If the charge hadn’t been set to stun, she would’ve died instantly. Without a word, they hoisted the body away from the precious water source, and headed back to the car. Setting into a depressingly well-rehearsed routine they buried her just off the side of the road with the well-worn shovel kept in the back of the trans-am for occasions such as these. Every time they used it Poison would keep his mind off the task by being insanely grateful that he wasn’t burying one of his brothers. He would give anything and everything to never have to. 

This time, however, all he could worry about was burying Grace. He couldn’t stop himself imagining having to shovel the dry desert dirt over her little body. With her head of curls, bony little arms and her wide brown eyes that were seldom dry. He unconsciously gripped the shovel a little tighter.  
He needed her to live through this. If nothing else he needed to see laughter come back into her eyes. He needed her to know that there was more to life, real emotional life, than grief. He needed her to know that it could be good. If he couldn’t do that, then he wasn’t sure any of this was worth it.

By the time the unknown runner was buried his head was spinning at the sheer number of ways a kid could easily die in the zones. He wiped his brow with the back of his hand and suppressed a moan. Oh God, maybe Ghoul was right. 

‘Think she had a gang?’ Ghoul asked as they headed back to the car. Poison just shrugged as he got behind the wheel. If her gang had escaped the fight and had planned on coming back for her, they might have just denied them the chance to bury their friend. But it was too late now. And besides what were they meant to do, just leave her there? 

Poison glanced at the darkening skyline and realised with a jolt that they should have been back hours ago. He hammered the gas before he could dwell on the thought that maybe they should have invested in a second radio rather than instruments.

 

*  
‘… and then you just connect the left wire into the socket and…Fuck!’ Kobra jerked his fingers away from the shock and glared down at the half-complete robot doll, lying innocently on the dusty table. Grace knelt on the booth and pointed to the inserted battery with a question in her eyes.

‘Oh’ said Kobra, blushing slightly, as he plucked out the black and white battery. ‘So uhh… make sure the battery pack isn’t engaged and then connect the left wire into the socket.’

Jet snorted without turning from his vigil at the darkening window. Grace got the feeling it wasn’t the first time something like this had happened while Kobra tinkered with his electronics.

Grace watched the doll intently- it was just starting to look like a robot should and when Kobra had finished the wiring, he had promised that it would light up as well. He had started just as the others had left on patrol. Leaving Jet and Grace to struggle through the cold bean stuff, he had begun rummaging around the small rusted junk pile behind the diner. He had dumped a load of old metallic shapes on to the table next to them, digging a couple of wires out of his pocket and adding them to the pile. Grace had curiously tiptoed out behind him when he strode out the door without a word. She had watched in amazement as he had used a little beeping box to make the vending machine outside spit out batteries without putting in any tokens at all! 

He met her eyes with a warm smile as she had clambered onto the booth to watch him work, and she found herself smiling back. She liked him, too, she decided. He didn’t try and make her talk when she didn’t want to. He was content just to sit in silence, letting her watch, occasionally giving commentary on what he was about to do. Hours later they were nearly finished.

Jet sat down next to them and exchanged a loaded glance with Kobra. Kobra’s mouth tightened and he shook his head slightly. 

‘They’re coming back.’ He muttered fiercely, putting an obvious end to their mostly non-verbal conversation with a pointed look at Grace. She resisted the urge to narrow her eyes. Grown-ups were always trying to act like everything was alright in front of her, even when it clearly wasn’t. She wasn’t a baby; she could see that they were trying to hide things from her. But before she could demand to know what was making them so worried, she was cut off by the roar of an approaching engine. 

Grace immediately tensed up, burying her head between the booth and Kobra’s shoulder. The last time she had heard loud engine noises sneaking up was when Luna had been taken from her. And now they were coming back to get her, too! They weren’t allowed to take any one else away, she wouldn’t let them! She was on the edge of tears when Kobra pulled her off to make her look at him. She frowned; he was smiling and it was confusing her. 

‘Shhh…It’s okay, it’s just Poison and Ghoul.’ He soothed. Grace could hear doors slamming and Jet yelling in the distance; something about ‘idiots’ and ‘ghosted’. She shakily let out her breath, her heart still racing in her chest, she didn’t even think before throwing her arms around Kobra’s neck in a hug. Soft tears escaped her eyes. But they were good ones not the bad ones she reminded herself as she felt the knot in her chest loosen- who could have imagined there was more than one type? He gently put an arm around her and let her just sit there for a moment. When the others finally came in, Poison came straight to her.  
‘Is she okay? Kobra, what happened?’ he asked, not even bothering to cover the edge in his voice. 

‘She’s fine’ Kobra said, sounding almost bored with Poison’s drama, ‘She just got scared by the noises.’ 

Grace sat up quickly, feeling slightly indignant. It sounded a bit pathetic when he said it like that and Grace didn’t want to be pathetic. … Luna was never silly like that; Luna hadn’t been scared of anything and neither would she. 

Poison nodded, his relief only a flash in his eyes, before his grim expression replaced it. 

‘I’ll sit with her, go get Jet to fill you in’ he directed. Kobra did so, but not before punching Poison hard in the shoulder.  
‘Fucker’ he muttered as he walked off to find Jet. 

To Grace’s surprise Poison didn’t look angry at all, in fact he looked a little guilty. He saw her expression and smiled.

‘He’s just annoyed because we’re really, really late’ he assured her. He sat down next to her and nudged her, pointing at the robot doll.

‘Is Kobra helping you make this?’ he asked her. She nodded. ‘It’s pretty awesome! I could probably find you some paint and we could make it any colour you wanted!’ he enthused, despite her lack of response. ‘Whatcha gonna call it?’ 

But Grace had stopped listening. Ghoul, Jet and Kobra were scurrying around the near-dark diner, gathering packs and cans of power pup and loading them into the car. 

‘Grace?’ Poison prompted, making a valiant effort to distract her attentions.

‘Where are they going? Are they leaving?’ Grace asked slightly panicked.  
Poison sighed, but seemed to accept defeat.

‘We’re all going together, Grace. But that’s okay because we’re going to keep you safe, alright?’ He said steadily. 

‘But why? Is it… do they know where we are? Are they coming back?’ she said shivering a little at the thought of their dead black eyes. Poison had explained one night that it was dracs from the city that chased them all the way out into the desert. It had been the dracs who had gotten Luna. Grace had known that they were bad, no matter what anyone in the city had tried to tell her.

‘The thing is…’ Poison paused and seemed to try and work out what to say. He seemed to be the only grown-up that always told her the truth if she asked for it.  
‘They’re not here yet but they’ve been close. Not only that, they know about the water near here, which means that there’s gonna be a lot of them around very soon.’  
‘Because of the water?’ Grace asked cocking her head to the side.

‘It’s just… it’s really hard to get water in the zones, you know? And if we can’t get water we’d either die or be forced back to the city…. So the same thing, basically’ Poison said, waving his arms around to emphasis his point. ‘So whenever dracs find water out in the desert, they bring a team out and poison it.’  
Grace looked back at him opened mouthed. 

‘But that’s so bad!’ she exclaimed. 

Kobra appeared over Poison’s shoulder, grimacing in agreement with Grace.

‘Believe it or not kid, they think they’re doing the right thing’ he told her.

Both Grace and Poison made identical noises of disbelief. Jet joined them, his eyes still roving the room for anything useful left behind.

‘Are you sure?’ Grace asked, grasping at straws ‘What if it wasn’t a drac that found the water? Then we wouldn’t have to go at all!’

Poison’s lips tightened.  
‘We’re sure, Grace.’ He said.

‘Are you?’ Jet asked hesitantly, making eyes with Poison, trying to hold back in front of her again. ‘Could it have been an accident? 

Posion just shook his head. ‘Too good a shot for an accident, it had to be a drac’ he said, he paused then for a second and then admitted, ‘’spose she could have pissed off her crew or something… but that’s pretty brutal and I don’t know if…’

‘It doesn’t matter. We can’t risk it and we’ve been here too long already’ Ghoul cut through. He was standing in the doorway, almost blending into the night sky. ‘We’re ready lets go.’ he said looking over Grace to catch Poison’s eye. He turned and headed back to the car without a word. 

Grace let Poison take her hand as they trudged outside to the car. She didn’t need him of course, but it made her feel just a little bit safer as the chill of the night breeze reached her.

In the backseat between Kobra, Jet and her as-yet-unnamed doll Grace felt her head lolling as she tried to fight off sleep. Ghoul was fiddling with the radio dials and suddenly the doctor’s voice filled the car. 

‘… next one is a show stopper, a bomb dropper, a cherry popper going out to all my silver-tongued devils in the dust and if a particular little motorbaby is out there listening to the waves I want her to know that there’s a special present waiting for her where the sun sings the blues.’  
The car was then filled with the loudest sounds Grace had ever heard. Her eyes widened. Did the doctor mean her?

‘Oooh I’m jealous!’ Jet whined jokingly at Grace.

‘Sounds like you’re his favourite!’ Poison smiled at her in the rear-vision mirror. 

‘Just don’t let pony hear you say that’ Kobra muttered.

.... action must be taken, we don’t need the key; we’ll break in! Something must be done about vengeance, a badge and a gun. Cause I’ll rip the mike, rip the stage, rip the system, I was born to rage against ‘em. Fist in ya face, in the place and I’ll drop the style clearly, know your enemy! ... 


End file.
